


Ocean Front Property in Arizona

by jenny_wren



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2020-06-25 14:26:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19747564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenny_wren/pseuds/jenny_wren
Summary: hey, hey, you'll never guess what I got the muggles to believe - can it be crack when it's technically canon?





	Ocean Front Property in Arizona

**Author's Note:**

> okay I am very slow and not on twitter so I only recently discovered JK Rowling's interesting tweets

“Hey, hey Cynth! Cynth you’ll never guess!”

Racing across the lawn, Pelham homed in on his best friend, who was sitting with her back against a tree reading her book, because she’d somehow managed to avoid this detention. Still if she had been there she’d have stopped him so it was all good. He grinned as Jacyntha looked up at him, squinting into the late afternoon sun. Her brown skin glowed and her fuzzed out hair was gilded into an almost halo. She was scowling at him, because she’d always be a warrior sort of angel.

“You’re supposed to be behaving,” she scolded. “And showing around the muggle-born parents who are touring the school.”

He flopped down beside her on the grass. “I know, I know, they’re all having a talk before dinner at the moment so Sangrail said I could go for now. And guess what I got the muggles to believe.” He squirmed with excitement. “Go on guess. You’ll never guess.”

“Ignoring the sheer illogic of that. Pelham you promised.”

A little hurt despite himself, he drooped in place. “I did promise you, and it wasn’t made up rituals, honest. Not even real rituals.” He might hold a furious grudge against Jacyntha’s muggle parents for buying into the soft-soap version of the wizarding world – they could ignore him all they wanted but they should pay attention to Cynth – but he wouldn’t break his promise. “You can trust me you know.”

“Of course I trust you,” she snapped.

He brightened and wriggled forward until he could nudge her with his elbow, “So go on, guess.”

“How about you just tell me, and I’ll act appropriately awed?” she offered, but she put her book down and turned to face him properly. He basked under her attention for a moment and then returned to the matter at hand,

“Okay fine, be a spoilsport. Not even one guess?”

“Pel,” she warned.

“Okay, okay.” The urge to show off his brilliance was too much for him to spin it out any longer. “I convinced the muggles that Hogwarts didn’t always have bathrooms. Before adopting Muggle plumbing methods in the eighteenth century witches and wizards simply relieved themselves wherever they stood and vanished the evidence.” He beamed, because how could she not see that was genius.

Of course he was under-estimating her. She drew herself up and put on her most unimpressed look, “Muggles didn’t have plumbing methods in the eighteenth century.”

“Jacyntha!” he howled. “That is not the point.”

“Well it’s true. You’re looking at the nineteenth century before plumbing became in any way mainstream.”

“Cynth,” he whined and nudged her again.

She laughed, Jacyntha had a lovely rippley laugh. Pelham might or might not do absurdly ridiculous things just to hear that laugh.

“Fine,” she leaned into his side. “That is hilarious, you terrible person. Also you are incredibly gross and I cannot imagine how anyone would be daft enough to believe that, even muggles.”

“Well they did.”

“But how? Throughout history people have created bathrooms given the slightest opportunity. Muggles had privies through the entire medieval period for Circe’s sake. And frankly these muggles can never have gone camping if they think relieving yourself wherever you stand isn’t an awkward bobbling dance nobody wants to do if they have the choice in the matter.”

“Guys have it easier,” he said smugly.

“Only most of the time. And the logistics of it, the smell, and toilet paper and, ugh, ugh, ugh. It’s all gross. But even if they assume all wizards are gross, which is a fair enough assumption given you’re acting as our representative –”

“Cynth!”

“Hey, you brought this on yourself. How did you even come up with the idea anyway? you’re not right in the head. But even if they do assume all wizards are gross, surely they have to realize this is a _school_. A school where people _learn_ magic. Can you imagine the mess fifty eleven year olds would make trying and failing to a use a banishment charm?”

He gurgled with laughter, “Oh Merlin, you’ve made it so much worse, I didn’t even think of that.”

Jacyntha giggled at him, “You’re going to be in such trouble,” she warned.

“Don’t know what you’re laughing about, you’re going to be in trouble right along with me.”

“This has nothing to do with me.”

Shaking his head he cheerfully talked over her objections, “Right along with me. If they actually believe you had nothing to do with it, they’ll slap you into detention anyway, for not stopping me.”

He grinned back at her helpless glare because that had happened before.

“Alright then.” Jacyntha jerked her robes straight. “This is obviously bothering you way more than I realized, and if we’re being called liars anyway, we might as well go all in.” She tucked her book into her bag and stood up. Reaching down she held out her hand to him, “Come help me convince my parents and the other muggles that the Founders built Hogwarts just the way it is now.”

Taking her hand automatically, Pelham stared at her, stared at Hogwarts, and then back at her, “But nobody’s going to believe they built that gothic monstrosity in the tenth century. Nobody built castle-castles in tenth century England. Originally Hogwarts was a group of long houses built beside the remains of a Roman villa – that Slytherin claimed because he was an elitist snob. The original Hogwarts’ Houses were literally houses.”

“So? People who’ll believe we didn’t have toilets will believe anything. Now come on.” She tugged at his hand and Pelham reluctantly scrambled to his feet.

“We are going to get into so much trouble.”

“I bet we can charm the self-updating original of _Hogwarts A History_ into changing its records. It has quite a sense of humour unlike that sniffy hat. Helga must have been a riot at parties.”

“So much trouble.”

“If we’re quick about it, you could write up some sort of information pamphlet to hand out. We need to get to the library.”

She strode away briskly. Pelham stared after her,

“You know everyone thinks I’m the one who’s the troublemaker,” he yelled. She turned to look back at him, all neat and demure. None of the other students who were glaring at him for disrupting the quiet could see the mischief dancing in her dark eyes.

“This is so unfair,” he moaned as he jogged to catch her up. “Stop grinning at me. We’re both going to be suffering in detention.”

“That’s okay. It was clearly a mistake to let you get put in detention without me.” She bumped her shoulder companionably against his. “Do you reckon we can convince them Merlin the elder and Merlin the younger were the same person?”

“Jacyntha!”


End file.
